


Traps for the Wary

by ifitwasribald



Category: The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: 1996, Bruce maybe shouldn't have a security clearance, Gen, Pre-Hulk Bruce, Warning for References to Child Abuse, kid!Natasha
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-11-29
Updated: 2012-11-29
Packaged: 2017-11-19 20:15:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,745
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/577225
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ifitwasribald/pseuds/ifitwasribald
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Bruce suffered through a lot of academic conferences on the way to earning his degrees--at some point they started to blend together in his mind. But not this one.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Traps for the Wary

**Author's Note:**

> Trigger Warning: This fic contains references to child abuse. They aren’t pervasive or graphic, other than brief descriptions of scars/injuries, but they're definitely there.

The applause died down, and Bruce swept his notes into his battered backpack and pushed his chair back to stand. The chair rocked and threatened to tip over before landing on all four legs with a too-loud crack. Bruce tried to ignore it, as he ignored the attempt at conversation from Dr. Langer and the smile of thanks from the moderator. 

He made his way up the aisle as quickly as he could in the press of students, academics, and researchers now stretching their legs after the lengthy panel. Some threatened to approach him, but none kept at it after meeting his eyes. He pushed open the double doors and strode out into the cooler air of the lobby.

Fuck Koffman anyway. She knew damn well that Bruce’s gamma radiation work was tied up with classified military data, and just as well that Bruce couldn’t say so in a public conference. Why the hell else would Bruce have been presenting his second string project--some theoretical paper that barely held his interest? That blowhard had to have known that getting into the gamma stuff would embarrass him, leave him without any decent answer that wouldn't get him in hot water with the Department of Defense. 

As if the water at the DoD weren’t already plenty hot. At this rate it would take him decades to get his research into any kind of shape for the practical trials his funders were pushing for. And didn’t it just grate that he was decades away from attaining decades old results. Fuck Erskine too, and the whole ass-backwards military industrial complex while he was at it. As if he were working through his second PhD in hopes of creating some kind of super soldier, in a world that rendered any such thing ridiculously moot. But DoD controlled all the serious research grants, and Bruce knew how to dance with them what brung him.

That didn’t mean he liked it.

His fingers vibrated with the need for some kind of cathartic violence, but as usual there was nothing he could let himself do with the tension.

Halfway to the elevators he realized that he didn’t have any particular destination in mind. The privacy of his room called to him, but so did hunger and a certain sort of thirst. The conference was in the middle of nowhere, and he hadn’t rented a car, so it would have to be the vending machine or the hotel bar. The vending machine wouldn’t have whiskey. 

He passed the check-in counter, with its bored attendant, and a little colony of couches and seats occupied by conference attendees. One was missing, its place marked by four shallow dents. Parallel tracks of disturbed carpet led to the missing armchair, tucked into a corner, its high back turned to Bruce and most of the room. A pair of legs in bright orange socks and scuffed sneakers hung over one arm.

Bruce continued on to the bar, glancing back as he turned into it to see the occupant of the chair. A girl, probably eleven or twelve, pouring over a textbook of some kind. 

Some attendee’s kid, Bruce concluded absently as he seated himself at the bar. Bored out of her mind, most likely. But not his problem. He ordered a whiskey and a burger, and pulled out his notes.

 

Bruce left the bar two hours and four drinks later. The girl had shifted position, her legs neatly curled under her and the book supported by one arm of the chair. As Bruce passed her, she absently tugged down the sleeve of her t-shirt. The movement drew his eyes to an angry red circle just visible below the fabric. It was small. Just about the size, Bruce knew, of the tip of a lit cigarette.

His hands balled themselves up into fists and his jaw clenched, but he didn’t stop until the elevator doors closed behind him. Alone with the soft music, he bruised one fist against the wall and rubbed his knuckles all the way up to his floor.

 

He saw the girl again before the first panel the next morning, piling a small plate high with mediocre pastries from the hospitality table. As he waited in the line for coffee, he watched her hoist her purple backpack over one shoulder and make her way to an empty corner. 

He scanned the room, trying to determine which of the gathered researchers and academics she was with. None of them seemed to be paying her any attention beyond the occasional curious glance. She sat on the floor with her back to one wall, fished a battered paperback out of her bag, and nibbled on a pastry as she started to read. The front cover of the book faced away, but Bruce recognized it anyway--the Phantom Tollbooth. He smiled fondly as he bent to fill a paper cup from the coffee dispenser and made his way into the conference room.

 

Three inane presentations later, the conference broke for lunch. Bruce checked his watch and considered. There’d be an hour and a half free--easily enough time to get some work done if he skipped out on the meet-and-greet luncheon. He really ought to rub elbows, but the bad taste in his mouth from Koffman’s ill-timed question lingered, and he couldn’t bring himself to attempt small talk.

Bruce found a bench in the deserted hotel courtyard, pulled a sheaf of printouts out of his backpack, and settled in.

Perhaps fifteen minutes later the door to the lobby opened and the girl slipped through. There were several benches available, but she sat on his, leaving a few feet of space between them. She took out a textbook and opened it, but cast a sidelong glance his way.

Bruce tried to keep his focus on the work in front of him, but it was a losing battle. There was something odd about the kid. He couldn’t place his finger on what, but it was distracting as a toothache. He looked over at her, and she seemed to take that as permission to talk to him.

"So, you're supposed to be some kind of genius or something, right?"

"Or something."

"So you tell me if this is right." She shoved the textbook at him, pointing to one of the problems. A folded piece of notebook paper contained her own solution, written in a meticulously neat hand. 

Bruce glanced at it. "Yeah, it's right."

"The book says it isn't. In the back, where the answers are."

"The book's wrong."

“My teacher says the book doesn’t get things wrong.”

“Your teacher’s an idiot.”

She nodded in satisfaction and put the book down behind her as she leaned over to peer at his notes. “What are you doing?”

“Working.” It came out a little gruffer than he intended, and the girl flinched away. The motion shifted the worn collar of her shirt, and out of the corner of his eye he noticed a dark purple splotch on her collarbone underneath it.

Shit.

“I’m sorry,” he told her. 

She ignored him and returned her attention to the book.

Bruce tried to think of something else to say, but everything that came to mind rang hollow. He couldn’t save this girl from whatever shitty situation she was caught in any more than anyone had been able to save him. To pretend otherwise--to say that everything would be all right, that she would get through this, that she need only be strong, was more bullshit than Bruce could stomach. Words were no use, and he didn’t have anything else to offer, so he gave up and bent his head over his papers.

But almost immediately he realized that he had no chance of getting anything done. His mind refused to latch onto the numbers. It was all he could do to keep his eyes on them. Part of his attention--most of it, truth be told--stayed on the girl. She kept her face buried in the book, but somehow he could feel her eyes on him, carefully watching him without ever turning her head.

When she put the book aside and hopped off the bench, Bruce let out a breath he didn’t know he’d been holding. But she didn’t leave--instead she pulled a sheet of paper out of her bag and started to fold it. 

A moment later she had a passable paper airplane, which she launched across the courtyard. It made it all of four feet before taking a dive for the stone walkway. She retrieved it and studied the thing carefully before refolding the wings and trying again. This time it managed five feet.

“Fold up the tips of the wings,” Bruce suggested.

She shot him a dubious look, but followed his instructions, and this time the airplane made it a bit further before tangling in a decorative shrub.

She smiled to herself as she pulled it out and proceeded to try a number of variations--one wingtip folded, narrower wings, broader wings, and so on, until the bit of paper started to look the worse for all the creases.

Bruce found a smile on his own lips as he watched her fiddle and experiment. Knowing a lost cause when he saw one, he gave up any pretense at work and tucked his papers into his backpack. He looked over at the girl, and tried to think of some kind of peace offering. “You want a soda or something?”

Her attention immediately shifted from the plane to him. Somehow her gaze was more assessing than both his thesis committees put together. But apparently she liked what she saw. “Root beer?” she asked.

“Sure.” 

He was halfway to the little alcove where they hid the vending machines before he realized that he’d left his wallet in his backpack, and didn’t have any change on him. He doubled back and pushed open the door to the courtyard, feeling a little sheepish. Only to curse himself for a fool when he saw that she had his bag open and was rifling through for-- no, not his wallet, actually, though maybe she had that already. What she had in her fist was a handful of papers. 

His papers. 

His classified, had-to-sign-away-his-firstborn-to-the-DoD papers. A little ball of ice formed in the pit of his stomach. 

He made it to her in two strides, and snatched the papers out of her hand. “What the hell do you think you’re doing?”

She shrank back, tears suddenly visible in her eyes, and Bruce froze.

“I just wanted some more paper,” she told him, a little quaver in her voice. “I didn’t know it was important.”

He looked down at the pages in his fist and felt his chest tighten. For some reason, all he could think was that he’d never noticed before how much his own hand resembled his father’s.

He forced himself to take a breath. What he’d thought a kid her age wanted with classified documents, he didn’t know. The tension was obviously getting to him. He glanced at the printed numbers, the equations scribbled in his own cramped handwriting. She wouldn’t even-- 

He stopped again, his eyes narrowed in surprise, and he looked at each sheet for a long moment. The icy feeling in his gut was back. “These are from three different pads. The odds of you picking _these_ three pages....” He looked up at her. “How did you even know what to look for?”

She didn’t answer--just glared at him with her watchful eyes, suddenly free of tears. Tension vibrated in every line of her body, the fight or flight instinct made flesh, but frozen at a point of indecision. Or of readiness. 

Bruce had no idea what she was going to do. He wondered if she knew herself.

“I’m impressed,” he offered. “I don’t care who prepped you--not a lot of kids your age could have recognized this.” He laughed shortly. “Hell, half the assholes here couldn’t be taught to pick these out.”

She made no move to reply, and Bruce realized he was at least as much at a loss for what to do as she was. 

“You’re doing good work for people who are hurting you.” Bruce eyed the burn on her arm, then pointedly flicked his eyes over the bruise on her clavicle.

“I did those myself,” she spat out. The set of her jaw held a strange sort of pride.

Bruce blinked. He gave himself a minute to process. “To get to me?”

She glared, but didn’t deny it.

Bruce tried to wrap his head around that. No, he couldn’t do it--the whole thing was too strange. Anger and fear both deserted him, leaving some dry part of his mind to note that this definitely wasn’t what he’d expected when he’d signed on for the classified research grant. He snorted. “They couldn’t send someone to seduce me? I thought that was traditional.”

“Do you want me to seduce you?” She pitched her voice lower, almost a purr, and made a visible effort to relax her posture into something sensual.

“What? No. God no.” He took an involuntary step backward.

His reaction seemed to calm her, but when she spoke, the confidence in her voice rang hollow. “Too bad. Pervs are easy marks, and they never report you to anybody.”

Bruce felt himself shudder.

“I always stab them before they do anything.” The confidence there sounded a little more genuine.

“Why haven’t you stabbed me yet?” Strange to even think it, but Bruce was suddenly sure that this particular kid could kill him where he stood if it suited her.

She shrugged. Maybe it didn’t suit her, then.

“OK, well, not that I don’t appreciate it. But, uh, what now?”

She didn’t seem to know any more than he did.

“What are they going to do to you if you don’t bring these back?” He gestured with the papers in his hand.

She looked down and didn’t answer, which he took as answer enough. But then she looked up, sly hope written all over her face. “You could give me part of a page,” she suggested. “You could pick.”

“Why would I do that?”

She looked away, and when she looked back the hope was gone. “You shouldn’t. You’re the one that asked what they’d do to me, like you give a damn.”

He almost certainly shouldn't, but he found that he did, in fact, give a damn. He looked back at the pages in his hands and didn't see anything worth all this. Bruce didn't go in for false modesty--his work was excellent, brilliant even--but the military uses of it were laughable at best, and would be for years to come.

Very deliberately, he tore off the last couple of inches of all three pages. The tear was almost at the margin, so none of the original data would be intelligible. Just a few snippets of his own work remained, and not his best. He held them out. “Tell them it was all you could get.”

She eyed him for a moment, and then moved like lightning to snatch the paper out of his hands. “I know what to tell them.”

“Right.” He picked up his bag and stuffed the remains of the papers back in it, checking to see that his wallet was still there. It was. He looked up at her, wondering if he should say something else. For a man who had just technically committed treason, he felt strangely light hearted. But nothing came to mind, so he shouldered the bag and started towards the hotel door. 

Two paces later he stopped and turned around. “Seriously, you’re a smart kid, you must have other options.”

She just laughed, an ugly sound made all the uglier for coming out of a child’s mouth.

She was probably right. An organization that would send out a kid her age as a spy was probably an organization that wouldn’t hesitate to kill her, or worse, if it served their interests. “You’ll have options someday.” Maybe. If she lived that long. “Take one, will you?”

She didn’t answer, and he turned again to leave.

He’d nearly reached the door when she spoke. “You know I played you, right?” She held up the torn bits of paper. “They wouldn’t have done anything, and you shouldn't care anyway.”

“If you say so,” he agreed amiably. “You still want that soda?”

**Author's Note:**

> Concrit welcome, _especially_ (but not only) on treatment of child abuse issues. I am lucky to have no personal experience in that area, and hope that the treatment wasn't disrespectful or otherwise bad (but would really like to be told if it was).


End file.
